Jules and Jim (1962)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Jules and Jim (1962) – F. Truffaut

The first thing that strikes you about Jules and Jim is the exuberance (joie de vivre?) with which director Francois Truffaut endows the story.  As in his first two films (The 400 Blows, 1959, and Shoot the Piano Player, 1960), Truffaut experiments with film technique, mixing and matching styles in a way that keeps the viewer interested and shows off what Raoul Coutard (cinematographer) could do.  In fact, the first reel, detailing the relationship between best friends Jules and Jim (and the women they loved before they met Catherine) speeds by so fast, with so much cutting between anecdotes, that it is hard to keep up. Part of this may be due to the use of offscreen narration that fleshes out the story and reveals the characters’ inner thoughts and feelings – there are a lot of subtitles to read!  But once Jules (Oskar Werner) and Jim (Henri Serre) meet Catherine (Jeanne Moreau), the film slows a bit to better observe their melodramatic relations across the decades from just before WWI until some years after.  I suppose it comes as no surprise that Truffaut takes the male point of view and treats Catherine and her willful ways as both an object of desire and the cause of suffering; perhaps it is a bit ambivalently sexist but Moreau is nothing if not empowered in the role.  Yet, despite the exuberance, there is a profound melancholy at the core of the film – a yearning for a love that cannot be and perhaps an acknowledgement that it may be difficult for a free spirit to maintain a stable relationship with any one person, let alone two (or three), no matter how strong their passions sometimes are.  Those around them can and do get burned. Ultimately, it isn’t clear whether Truffaut is advocating the sort of compromises that most people make to keep their relationships alive or whether he sides with Catherine’s unfettered approach. Perhaps, as the ending suggests, he knows that some candles burn much too brightly to last.  Fortunately, this jewel of the French New Wave is ours to treasure forever.

Dunkirk (2017)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Dunkirk (2017) – C. Nolan

I watched Mrs. Miniver (1942) back in July which also features the evacuation of British soldiers from Dunkirk, France, during WWII.  But while the earlier film was a melodramatic piece of wartime propaganda to rally the Allies, Christopher Nolan’s current look back is a visceral “you are there” piece of bravura filmmaking that likely also stokes the patriotic home fires in the Brexit-era UK (or perhaps it is meant to remind them of their bonds with Europe?). No doubt this looked better on the big screen than on the back of the seat in front of me on Qantas Flight 7, but it was still immersive enough. We follow three storylines that intersect at Dunkirk where Allied troops were besieged by the Germans and ultimately evacuated by an armada of private yachts and small boats sailed by civilian volunteers. The storylines are:  1) A couple of nameless soldiers attempt to escape on a first aid vessel (which is promptly sunk) as bombs drop everywhere on the beach; 2) a pair of pilots shoot down enemy bombers, hoping not to run out of fuel; 3) a father and son (and a local boy who joins them) take their small boat to Dunkirk and rescue a shell-shocked airman on the way.  There is very little dialogue, an immense crowd of extras, and a soundtrack that propels everything forward, sounding not unlike the dropping of bombs. I suspect that without the soundtrack, courtesy of Hans Zimmer, this film, like many others, would lose a lot of its impact. That said, the meticulous attention to authentic period detail is truly impressive.  These elements combined make this a film that could (and probably should) be watched again (on a bigger screen).

  

La La Land (2016)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

La La Land (2016) – D. Chazelle

Definitely evocative of the classic musicals of the 1950s (think Vincente Minnelli) – with a bittersweet flavour that wasn’t really present in the swinging comic 1930s (think Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers), Damien Chazelle’s third feature knows its history but doesn’t quite transcend it.  Instead, Chazelle plays within the rules of the genre (in which characters can break into song and dance at any given moment) and this has led to some accusations of sexism because the relationship between Sebastian (Ryan Gosling) and Mia (Emma Stone) does evoke 1950s traditional gender roles (and expectations) despite the fact that the leads’ efforts toward developing careers in the entertainment industry (jazz pianist and actor, respectively) are given relatively equal attention.  Although the film opens audaciously with a big number on a highway overpass with a large cast of dancers and then quickly shows us a color-coded sequence featuring Emma Stone and her roommates, things then calm down a bit as Stone and Gosling begin their romance.  That’s not to say that Chazelle doesn’t have a great emotional touch or that his script doesn’t continually hit the right buttons for an homage of this sort, it just doesn’t stay at that high level of surprise/stunningness (nor should it, if the movie is to follow screenwriting 101 norms, which it does).  Gosling is fine, rather subdued and perhaps not much of a singer/dancer (though he taught himself piano for the role) but Stone is very charismatic (if somewhat unusual looking with such large eyes) and together they manage to make their relationship seem real enough with a trajectory that is more-or-less believable.  I say “more-or-less” because in a musical such as this, realism isn’t really necessary, nor even expected; Chazelle gives into the fantasy elements of his script but has the wisdom to underscore the implausibility with the same sort of sadness that you find in Demy’s Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964).  Again, the thrills found here are not a result of anything new but just a fine example of a master craftsman using the best materials to recreate something that was well-loved from the past (albeit with a new script, songs, and players).  

Level Five (1997)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Level Five (1997) – C. Marker

Chris Marker’s essay films are very heady stuff.  He follows a stream of consciousness, riffing on a particular theme but allowing for digressions that take in his favourite themes, cats and movies.  But always his films focus on memory and the motivated desire to remember or to forget.  His most famous essay film is Sans Soleil (1983), which focuses in part on Japan, as does Level Five – but most people know Marker (if they know him at all) as the director of La Jetée (1962), a science fiction short that impressionistically ponders about time and memory (and was the basis for Terry Gilliam’s Twelve Monkeys, 1995).  Level Five blends a focus on the internet and the knowledge society with an examination of the Battle of Okinawa at the end of World War II.  Catherine Belkhodja plays Laura, a computer programmer tasked with designing a strategy game replicating the battle.  She speaks directly to the screen about her research into the history of war as well as her relationship with her offscreen colleague (who must be Marker himself, narrating portions of the film in his native French).  The facts we learn about the Battle of Okinawa are horrifying – large numbers of civilians committed suicide as the American troops approached or were killed by their loved ones if they were too young/helpless to kill themselves – but it is Marker’s queries about how such events are remembered (or repressed) that resonate most deeply.  So, again, the conceit of the film seems largely just a shell to allow Marker to freestyle his ideas about memory and the human experience, sad and terrible and unjust as it may often be.  And although we often see Belkhodja speak directly to the camera in an informal pose, Marker’s skill as an editor and a manipulator of images (his Macintosh computer is acknowledged in the final credits) means that the film is never boring or static – he takes us on a journey through (presumably found) footage and well-chosen discussion points by various talking heads (such as Nagisa Oshima), all aided by 1997-era computer graphics.  Yet, still this film seems ahead of its time and I lament the loss of Marker in 2012 at age 91. Who is his heir in this genre of experimental essay film-making?

  

The Exorcist (1973)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

The Exorcist (1973) – W. Friedkin

It was a dark and stormy night, so we watched this horror classic again (the version you’ve never seen from 2000 with extra footage restored by the writer, Blatty, and director, Friedkin).  Of course, it has lost some of its ability to shock after repeated viewings but it still isn’t too hard for me to return mentally to that moment when I stumbled into a dorm lounge at William & Mary where some students were watching this in the dark (its reputation had preceded it and I was totally freaked out).   Although probably responsible (to some degree) for the shift from the subtle implication school of horror that left most to the imagination (i.e., Val Lewton productions) to the no-holds-barred explicit approach of showing it all with special effects, Friedkin and team do introduce the horrifying supernatural events with a reasonably slow build up.  For example, you may have forgotten the prologue that takes place in northern Iraq showing Father Merrin (Max von Sydow) uncovering an ancient demonic artefact during an archaeological dig.  Then, the switch to Georgetown in Washington DC introduces us to actress Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) and her daughter Regan (Linda Blair) who seem perfectly normal (although part of a “broken” family: the first suggestion of the devil’s work or the potential cause of Regan’s later breakdown).  Only a short scene with a Ouija board that Regan uses to ask questions of “Captain Howdy” hints at the horror to come.  A parallel plot thread introduces us to Father Damien Karras (Jason Miller), a Jesuit priest and psychiatrist, who is trying to look after his elderly mother from a distance (she is in NYC and he is in DC) and simultaneously suffering a spiritual crisis – he feels that he is losing his faith.  As Regan’s behaviour gradually begins to change (after her bed starts shaking), she is treated to an increasing array of medical tests (some very invasive) before the doctors turn, first to psychiatry, and then to religion.  Cue Father Karras and later Father Merrin (freshly returned from the Middle East).  A related murder brings Detective Kinderman (Lee J. Cobb) onto the scene but all signs point to Regan and demonic possession (and those steps down to M Street).  You know the rest.  The funny thing about The Exorcist is that, despite its head-spinning and projectile vomiting and impossibly filthy language and obscene actions produced by a 12-year old girl (with the voice of chain-smoking Mercedes McCambridge), this is really a film that champions faith and conservative family values.  Indeed, its arrival in 1973, when the earlier Summer of Love values had been tainted by Altamount, Manson, Vietnam, and the encroaching Nixon scandal, seemed to both echo the problems of the times and also try to claw back some order in the shape of a religious force for good that could exorcise the demons and the horror that they were perpetrating.  So, there are deeper tectonic plates upon which the film’s crasser surface elements are sliding which may help to explain its lasting power.  If you choose to suspend your disbelief (and the book and film _were_ based on true events), then this could certainly freak you out big time.